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4.01 AVERAGE
4.01 AVERAGE
reflective
sad
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
I’d be curious to return to this story in ten years. There’s an irony in reading this for the first time as a first-year law student. An irony that I’m hesitant to unpack for the sake of self-preservation.
The Caius section, and its placement in the story, is brilliant. I continued to think of Fitzgerald’s “The Crack-Up.” I was reminded of Camus’ idea of dread as an inevitable checkpoint for the rational mind, too.
side note: homoeroticism w/ Gerashim?
Returning to The Crack-Up, Fitzgerald says he disliked all but the very young and the very old. Ivan is similar. I’m curious whether Gerashim exists as a bridge between Ivan and son (who remains innocent), or if Gerashim’s class (Russian Peasant) renders him child-like in Tolstoy’s eyes?
“He wanted to be caressed, kissed, wept over, as children are caressed and comforted.” I’m thinking of Dostoevsky’s Grand Inquisitor and of this story’s final scene.
There’s a choice to eschew the words of Ivan’s servants in an attempt at a dissociative effect (?)—it’s giving eat the rich—or it’s an attempt by Tolstoy to underscore Ivan’s lack of concern for anyone else in his house. Again, interpret according to the Marxist/Christian/Existentialist lens of your choice.
A brief Proust effect predating Proust by about a generation.
The story moves along Kierkegaard’s Aesthetic, Ethical, Religious stages so far as I can tell. I don’t know enough about either Tolstoy or Kierkegaard to connect the two more directly.
Three final things:
(1) “If I were to say that I have not lived as one ought. But that cannot possibly be acknowledged…” no further comment.
(2) “the boy seized it, pressed it to his lips, and wept.” Again, shades of TBK.
(3) TOBIAS WOLFF. I’ve never connected the two, but Tolstoy’s influences are ALL over Wolff’s work. I’ll read the rest of Tolstoy to better understand Wolff, if for no other reason.
On that note, here’s a Wolff interview snippet: “The stories of mine that I like the least are the ones I can look at now and see I already had the answers when I was writing them. I think that is a weakness in a story. I love “Master and Man” more than I love “The Death of Ivan Ilyich.”
Later in the interview, this Chekhov quote through Wolff’s memory:
“The human heart is a slumbering forest.”
The Caius section, and its placement in the story, is brilliant. I continued to think of Fitzgerald’s “The Crack-Up.” I was reminded of Camus’ idea of dread as an inevitable checkpoint for the rational mind, too.
side note: homoeroticism w/ Gerashim?
Returning to The Crack-Up, Fitzgerald says he disliked all but the very young and the very old. Ivan is similar. I’m curious whether Gerashim exists as a bridge between Ivan and son (who remains innocent), or if Gerashim’s class (Russian Peasant) renders him child-like in Tolstoy’s eyes?
“He wanted to be caressed, kissed, wept over, as children are caressed and comforted.” I’m thinking of Dostoevsky’s Grand Inquisitor and of this story’s final scene.
There’s a choice to eschew the words of Ivan’s servants in an attempt at a dissociative effect (?)—it’s giving eat the rich—or it’s an attempt by Tolstoy to underscore Ivan’s lack of concern for anyone else in his house. Again, interpret according to the Marxist/Christian/Existentialist lens of your choice.
A brief Proust effect predating Proust by about a generation.
The story moves along Kierkegaard’s Aesthetic, Ethical, Religious stages so far as I can tell. I don’t know enough about either Tolstoy or Kierkegaard to connect the two more directly.
Three final things:
(1) “If I were to say that I have not lived as one ought. But that cannot possibly be acknowledged…” no further comment.
(2) “the boy seized it, pressed it to his lips, and wept.” Again, shades of TBK.
(3) TOBIAS WOLFF. I’ve never connected the two, but Tolstoy’s influences are ALL over Wolff’s work. I’ll read the rest of Tolstoy to better understand Wolff, if for no other reason.
On that note, here’s a Wolff interview snippet: “The stories of mine that I like the least are the ones I can look at now and see I already had the answers when I was writing them. I think that is a weakness in a story. I love “Master and Man” more than I love “The Death of Ivan Ilyich.”
Later in the interview, this Chekhov quote through Wolff’s memory:
“The human heart is a slumbering forest.”
My fave of Tolstoy's works that I have read. Very interesting.
dark
reflective
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
went into this for a quick read before the year ends and came away with a renewed sense of existential dread :)
challenging
dark
reflective
This is a very sad, realistic, sort of meditation on life
and death. Looking into the thoughts of a very sick man who cannot come to terms with the fact that he is dying as he believes he has lived a good life. Very good.
and death. Looking into the thoughts of a very sick man who cannot come to terms with the fact that he is dying as he believes he has lived a good life. Very good.
This was a decent story that was destroyed by the ravings of a self-righteous, self-important Freshman English professor.